I spent the last week in Las Vegas, where I purposely avoided television, the internet, talk radio, and newspapers. I didn't even check in on my own blog. All things political were jettisoned from my life for an entire week. It was fantastic. I'd be quite happy to remove politics from my life completely, but alas, I cannot...not while the systematic destruction of the U.S. Constitution is underway in this country...not while the fascists leading our government are hell-bent on destroying the underpinnings of American liberty...not while our so-called leaders are busy destroying our collective economic future. I can't simply sit back and ignore these things, much as I'd like to.

It seems I missed a lot in my week away. On the plus side, the Iraq War ended. Thank goodness for that. I'm happy our troops are finally coming home, even if warmongering politicians like Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) are not happy. That war should never have been waged. It took the lives of 4,500 Americans and 100,000 Iraqis to get rid of the evil Saddam Hussein. There had to be a better way.

On the down side, the Bill Of Rights is about to take another big hit. The House voted in favor of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), 283-136, which eliminates the Due Process clause from the Bill Of Rights. The NDAA would allow Americans to be detained indefinitely without trial, and President Obama made sure Americans were included in the "you don't have no stinking rights !" group:

As [Senator Carl] Levin (D-MI) said last week, it was the White House itself that demanded Section 1031 apply to American citizens.

“The language which precluded the application of Section 1031 to American citizens was in the bill that we originally approved...and the administration asked us to remove the language which says that U.S. citizens and lawful residents would not be subject to this section,” said Levin, Chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

Obama was insistent on nullifying the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution, a curious position to take for a man who is allegedly an expert in Constitutional Law. Then again, Obama already has a history of ignoring the Constitution, as he did when he perverted the Commerce Clause by signing ObamaCare into law. The President is not alone in wanting to discard those quaint old rights found in our Constitution. 93 of his fellow Democrats also voted to discard them by voting for the NDAA. This is what Democrats means when they talk about a "living" or "evolving" Constitution. They mean they want to destroy it when it gets in the way of their political goals.

Even more interesting is the way the alleged limited government advocates on the Republican side of the aisle voted. The small government Constitution-adhering GOPers in the House voted FOR the NDAA by a margin of 190-43. What a bunch of phonies. Here's the money quote from Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC):

“It is not unfair to make an American citizen account for the fact that they decided to help Al Qaeda to kill us all and hold them as long as it takes to find intelligence about what may be coming next,” remarked Graham. “And when they say, ‘I want my lawyer,’ you tell them, ‘
Shut up. You don’t get a lawyer.’”

And here I thought Kim Jong Il died. Guess not. He's a Senator from South Carolina. We should build a Lindsay Graham Memorial in D.C. with the words "Shut up. You don't get a lawyer" inscribed on it to inspire future generations of fascist Americans.

The only bad thing about voting the totalitarian Obama out of office is that one of these Graham-like Republicans will probably take his place, assuming Ron Paul (R-TX) can't win the GOP nomination, which he probably can't, despite the fact that he's currently leading in Iowa.

When the Great Prevaricator, Obama, isn't eliminating our Constitutional rights, he's busy regulating us into submission. The Great Prevaricator does this while simultaneously pretending that the GOP wants to strip away all regulations and turn the country into the Wild West all over again. Obama says the Republicans want "dirtier air, dirtier water, less people with health insurance" to cover up for the fact that regulations have exploded during Obama's tenure in the Oval Office. The Wall Street Journal exposes the truth:

A lack of regulations is not the problem, despite what the Great Prevaricator would have us believe. Our problem is the control freak nature of the Obama administration.

In the next few days, President Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency is expected to issue another final regulation directed at electricity utilities. This rule, known as the Utility MACT, will impose an estimated $11 billion each year in new costs on our economy. It will threaten electricity-generating capacity in many parts of the country. And it’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to this administration’s runaway rulemaking.

And it doesn't matter how many jobs it costs us. It doesn't matter how negative are the effects on the economy. Those like Obama will use the negative effects of their policies to call for yet more control, more regulation, and less Constitutional restrictions on their power. That's the way totalitarians roll.